Free Write - Rainbows

After four canicules (heat waves) in Geneva between May and August with only a few days where the temperature dropped from the high nineties to bearable did we have a blessed rainstorm. Then we were rewarded with an arc en ciel (rainbow). 

 

Julia's Free Write 

“Come on” she hollered.

It had been one of those years – one of the hottest in history.

And if you think that this is becoming a pattern, you would be right!

They had already had three major heatwaves, lasting 10 or 12 days – and a mini one.

Everyone was suffering, including animals and crops. What were they going to eat with their cheese this winter as the potato crop was greatly diminished and prices for even the remaining small ones would rise.

A basic food was going to become a luxury.

But that was tomorrow.

Today it had finally rained. Actually, more of a downpour, but there was rejoicing everywhere and hopes – they had given up on prayers – that the weather would finally have turned and that life – and conversations – could turn to other topics.

Meanwhile she was outside when it stopped. Why the call to “come on”?

There was a gorgeous rainbows: the promise perhaps of more rain to come.

D-L's Free Write

The courtroom was the first Sadie had ever been inside, but it looked like the thousands she has seen on television.

She'd entered a married woman. She left a divorcée.

Tess!

She didn't believe her now ex-husband had brought her ex-best friend since grade school and his future wife to court.

Tess walked over to her. "Sorry, Sadie . . ."

"I don't care." Sadie left the courthouse. Outside it was raining. By the time she reached her car, a VW, she was drenched.

The car was filled with the clothes she would need in Maine and a few family things. One was her grandmother's bean pot. She had never used it. Jim wouldn't eat baked beans. Now she cooked whatever she wanted.

One more trip by the house where she and Jim had lived for ten years. His Tesla wasn't back yet. Her bank account was full from him paying her for her share of the house.

The rain had lessened then stopped. Still the drive to Maine was tiring.

Following directions she left the highway for a country road. She took the opportunity to stretch her legs by a field. Leaning against a fence, she saw a halo of a rainbow shown from left to right.

This is my pot of god, she thought. My new life.

Rick's Free Write

Sometimes, symbolism evolves.

When I was young, I was told that rainbows represented a promise from God that He/She would never again flood the earth, as H/S had done in the story of Noah and the Ark. I guess that’s so we didn’t worry every time it rains.

In recent years, the red-orange-yellow-green-blue-purple of the rainbow has become more closely identified with the LBGTQ+ movement, aka ‘Gay Pride.’

We have a shopping basket, a plastic weave type, with the various colours of the rainbow. It’s actually the second one; we wore out the first rainbow basket and were fortunate to find a replacement fairly quickly.

The current basket is on its last strands, patched up with coloured duct tape. We even have friends searching for a replacement.

When I walk through the village to the grocery, I sometimes wonder if some villagers, especially the young male vagrants, think I must be gay. Or at least bi, as they also see me and the basket with D-L.

I don’t really care what they think. I’m inclined to the phrase from Seinfeld: “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” 

Rick Adams is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices.com, a weekly newsletter reporting the airline industry  top stories . He is the author of The Robot in the Simulator. AI in Aviation Training.  

Visit D-L.'s website  https://dlnelsonwriter.com, She is the author of 15 fiction and three non fiction books. Her 300 Unsung Women, bios of women who battled gender limitations, can be purchased  at https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/300-unsung-women-d-l-nelson/1147305797?ean=9798990385504 

Visit Julia's blog. She has written and taken photos and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/